May 13th. Get Ready.

Posted 03/25/2008 12:42:28 pm
by MTV News.

It’s not often we believe release dates on upcoming rap albums. I mean, seriously, truth and deadlines and release dates are all just relative concept in hip-hop. But Lil Wayne‘s much, much, much anticipatedTha Carter III album is scheduled for May 13th, and well, we might just believe it.The argument for: there is so much riding on this album for Weezy, that there’s no way his label, Universal, could screw up this marketing plan. This is the album that is supposed to validate the years of internet hype on Wayne, with hip-hop audiences, with newfound rock audiences, with people who actually buy records and don’t download the hundreds of free songs he’s given away since 2004.

The argument against: Um, it’s hip-hop. It’s Lil Wayne.

Verdict: Somewhere around April 29th, the album leaks (2-week window, as always), and Wayne pulls a Jack White and says, “Let’s release this to stores now!” and it immediately shows up on iTunes and in record stores and all sorts of other legitimate places people still buy music. Or, more likely, Weezy puts it out next week for free on an internet mixtape hosted by DJ Drama. Coin flip, really.